The Handmaids' Tale
by Hawki
Summary: Oneshot: To fight the Swarm, the COG needed Gears. To get Gears, they needed people. To get people, they needed more babies to be born. And to do that, well...


**The Handmaids' Tale**

"Kill 'em all, and let God sort them out."

Mina Jinn didn't know who said that, or when it had been said, or when she'd read it. Nevertheless, it was at times like this when she welcomed the phrase. Times like this, as the war with the Swarm continued, and she was quite happy to let her Gears kill every drone they saw and send them to "God" (if he existed) and let him send the fuckers straight to Hell (if that existed also) after being judged. And, likewise, if not for political and moral considerations, she would be happy to use those same Gears on the protesters outside Government House. The so-called handmaids who were dressed in red, protesting against the Fertility Act. Well, maybe not happy, granted, but still, at least satisfied on some level.

Even here in her office, she could hear them. The whining masses shouting slogans like "my body, my choice," "hands off my womb," and "a family is love." If she turned on the flatscreen (and she already had a few times) she could see COG National News (CNN), reporting on the demonstrations. So far, their reporters had toed the party line, but there was no hiding the fact that the women of Settlement 1 were angry. That they were protesting. That opinion polls had her approval rating at 14%, and that if there was one thing worse than having Gears keep the protesters in line, DeeBees were even worse. Which would be fine, because unless Baird found a way to protect his mechanical children from the Swarm's leeches, security were all the DeeBees were good for now.

_Are you even trying Baird? _Jinn wondered as she continued to go through the documents. _Or are you enjoying this?_

She sighed, signed the document that clarified that the Fortification Act would remain in place, and went to the next one. Reports on the hide and seek game that had been going on for a month as various Gear squads scoured the ruins of Sera for the Swarm's nexus point. Find the queen, kill her, and then deal with a Swarm that was only slightly less dangerous than it had been under the direction of a psychopathic bitch. Whatever the queen was, be it Myrrah, Reyna, or something else, in a way, Jinn envied her. She could send her 'citizens' to their deaths without a second thought. In contrast…well, for starters, there was a pile of letters she had to sign that were still on her desk that she had to send to the families of deceased Gears.

"Sergeant Fenix, you cannot be in here!"

_Speak of the Devil. _Jinn looked up from the document at the giant oak doors that marked the entrance to her office. Beyond them, she could hear the sound of heavy footsteps and an argument that was getting closer and closer.

_Right on time. _She sighed and leant back in her chair, watching the doors. _Three. Two. One…_

The doors burst open.

_Ah, there we go._

And in walked Sergeant Marcus Michael Fenix, followed by a pair of Onyx Guards who were trying (and failing) to keep him at bay. Marcus walked up to the desk, still wearing his Gear armour, and thumped both of his oversized hands down on the wood.

"Jinn, you've gone too far this time."

Jinn sighed. "Funny. Usually that's what I tell you." She looked at the Onyx Guards who were standing behind Marcus, looking unsure as to what to do. "Wait outside. I'll call you when I need you."

"Yes ma'am."

"Of course ma'am."

Marcus glanced as the two heavily armoured men walked out, closing the door behind them gingerly. He looked back at Jinn. "Nice pair of dogs you have there."

"I do. I like dogs actually. They know so much about loyalty."

Even with his bandanna, Jinn could see something twitch in Marcus's forehead. _Good, _she reflected.

"So," she said. "Assuming that you or your friends haven't done something that went against my explicit instructions, to what do I owe this ple…visit?"

Marcus pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket, unfolded it, and slammed it down on the table. "This."

Jinn picked it up, frowning. "The Fertility Act. What of it?"

"It's got your signature on it."

"Of course it does. I wrote it, legislated it, and as of a week ago, ordered it to be enforced."

"And how's that going for you?" Marcus asked.

Jinn spun round in her chair to the window behind her desk. Past the windows, past the glass, she could still hear the "handmaids" chanting. Yelling about their wombs.

"You seriously thought this was going to fly?"

Jinn swung back at Marcus. "I don't particularly care what the people think. I care about the future of the COG and the survival of the human race."

"And which comes first in that list?"

Jinn scowled and said nothing.

"Forced IVF for all fertile women from the ages of eighteen to forty," Marcus said, reading from the paper. "Expectations to bear at least three children to boost the population. Exceptions granted to enlisted servicewomen."

"I know the words of the act Marcus."

"Then you also know that by your own law, you're exempt from it thanks to your age."

"Duly noted," Jinn said. "And you should also know that there's a precedent with this with the fertility program that your wife and I used."

"Don't you dare," Marcus murmured. Jinn saw him clench his right fist. "Don't you dare bring Anya into this."

"Like it or not, Marcus, she was the face of the program. And she's still the face of this one."

Marcus remained silent. He looked ready to punch her, but Jinn was confident that even Marcus Fenix had enough control to avoid that. Granted, if she was wrong, a broken jaw was the best outcome she could expect.

"Frankly I don't know why you're so worked up," Jinn continued. "I mean, it's not as if you've going to have any children soon, and after your son's death, I'd have thought that-"

Marcus raised his arm and brought it forward, only stopping mere inches before Jinn's nose. She stood there, steadying her breathing and trying to keep her heartbeat under control. Looking at Marcus, his eyes, his nose, the quiver in his wrist, she could tell that he was doing his best to keep it together as well. And even as he slowly lowered his arm, she could tell that he was still struggling.

"I'm sorry," Jinn murmured. "I shouldn't have said that."

"Go to hell," Marcus grunted.

"Believe it or not, I mean it," she said. She gestured out the window. "My son's out there, Marcus. And every day, I get up with the knowledge that I might get one of these letters." She gestured to the pile that had accumulated on her desk. "You lost a son. And I'm sorry. Because if I lost mine, I don't think I…" She sighed, took off her glasses and began to clean them. "James deserved better."

"He did. And so do the people."

She put her glasses back on. "Answer's no, Marcus."

"Jinn, you-"

"_No," _she said, getting to her feet. "You're a Gear. Your job is to fight. My job is to run the COG and keep gears of a different kind turning. To do that, I need people. To get people, I need babies. To get babies, I need the fertility program, and I need everyone to get onboard."

"You realize that you're just a step away from the creches, right?"

Jinn frowned. "How do you know about that?"

"Oh, I know a lot about the COG's dirty little secrets."

"Well, I don't doubt that. But you want to know another secret, Marcus?" She walked over to stand face to face. "Cross me, and I can put you in a four by six for the rest of my life."

Marcus glared at her. "I've been in the Slab," he murmured. "Doubt you've got a shithole worse than that."

"Well obviously you don't know all of my secrets then." She gave him a pat on the shoulder that was meant to be as patronizing as possible and returned to her desk. "Now then. Unless you've found the Swarm's nexus, you've got nothing to say to me on the matter. These handmaids can whine, they can protest, they can invoke the Tyran suffragette movement all they want, but the law's the law."

"You mean the Fortification Act."

Jinn looked up at him. "And? What of it? Prescott led the COG for fifteen years with that framework."

Marcus raised an eyebrow. "You think that's it then? Fifteen years of fighting the grubs?"

"I don't know Sergeant Fenix. Why don't you and your friends find the Swarm's nexus and make it easier for me?"

"I'm not here to make things easy for you Jinn."

"No? Then what are you here for?"

Marcus didn't answer. At least not at first. But as she saw him finger something in her pocket, something with string attached to a set of COG tags, she had an idea. Anger was an emotion that could get people like Marcus Fenix barging into her office. Thing was, so was grief.

"Anya didn't agree to the fertility treatments for you," Marcus murmured. "Just so you know that."

Jinn gave him a sympathetic look. "Believe it or not, I do."

"Then you should also know that forcing people to have children is a terrible idea on every conceivable level."

"Really, Marcus? Is it? Because the way I see it, we need Gears, we need citizens, and we needed them yesterday. Because even if you take out the queen, we've still got to deal with the Swarm. And they outnumber us in a ratio that I can't even begin to guess at."

Marcus grunted. "Even if we win, even if we get an army of baby boys and girls wielding Lancers, you know there's no coming back from this, right?" He nodded towards a copy of the _New Ephyran Times _in the office's corner. "Think those polls can get any lower?"

"I'll accept the judgement of history, Marcus. Just as long as there's historians who can it." She pressed a button under her desk, and on cue, the office doors opened thanks to the Onyx Guards who walked in. "Now please. See yourself out."

One of the guards put a hand on Marcus's shoulder. He shoved it off, but nevertheless headed for the exit. Jinn watched him head out. Watched him linger at the door and give her a final look. Not quite resentment, not quite respect, but some measure of the two. A look that lasted only a second as Sergeant Fenix of the COG Army exited the office and, so she hoped, exited the building as well.

"My body, my choice!"

"Hands off my womb!"

Jinn sighed and leant back in her chair, rubbing her eyes. Marcus hated her. The people hated her. She'd signed into law an act that repulsed her, and knew that she'd never be forgiven for. This on top of a war that even with the Hammer of Dawn, the COG had no guarantee of winning. That this time, there was no Adam Fenix and no anti-imulsion device to save the day in one grand moment. No. It would be a war. A long, drawn-out war where thousands would die. Where that pile of condolence letters would get ever higher.

She had to tell herself she was okay with that. Because the alternative…

…that didn't even bear considering.

* * *

_A/N_

_The idea for this came from a comment made by an artist suggesting that _Gears 6 _could take inspiration from _The Handmaid's Tale_. Now, my first thought was "huh?" after reading that. My second thought, after the artist explained he was referring to its colour schemes, was "huh, okay." The third was "that actually isn't too bad an idea." I mean, under Prescott, there was the Creche Program where women were forced to bear children, and that's pretty similar to the fate of the handmaids in Gilead. Now, I doubt that _Gears 6 _would explore such a thing, if only because a TPS isn't the best format for it, but still..._

_Also, Jinn. Even if I'm not really a fan of her, I wanted to take a shot at writing for her. Because in _Gears 4_, Jinn is easy to dislike because she makes one bad decision after another. In _Gears 5 _however, while I think we're expected to dislike her, I don't think that's entirely fair. Because when it comes to chewing out Delta for now following chain of command, or objecting to the Hammer of Dawn being re-launched, or suggesting hooking up Kait to the hivemind to find the queen...these aren't unreasonable suggestions. Whether they're right or wrong is up to you, but still, it's different from _Gears 4 _and arguably for the best, even if we're still meant to dislike her from what I can tell._


End file.
